Texts:Shakespeare/cw162310: Difference between revisions

<h2>THE SECOND PART OF KING HENRY THE FOURTH</h2>

<p>  RUMOUR, the Presenter<br/>

   KING HENRY THE FOURTH<br/>

</p>

<p>  HENRY, PRINCE OF WALES, afterwards HENRY<br/>

   PRINCE JOHN OF LANCASTER<br/>

   PRINCE HUMPHREY OF GLOUCESTER<br/>

   THOMAS, DUKE OF CLARENCE<br/>

     Sons of Henry IV<br/>

</p>

<p>  EARL OF NORTHUMBERLAND<br/>

   SCROOP, ARCHBISHOP OF YORK<br/>

   LORD MOWBRAY<br/>

   LORD HASTINGS<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH<br/>

   SIR JOHN COLVILLE<br/>

   TRAVERS and MORTON, retainers of Northumberland<br/>

     Opposites against King Henry IV<br/>

</p>

<p>  EARL OF WARWICK<br/>

   EARL OF WESTMORELAND<br/>

   EARL OF SURREY<br/>

   EARL OF KENT<br/>

   GOWER<br/>

   HARCOURT<br/>

   BLUNT<br/>

     Of the King's party<br/>

</p>

<p>  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE<br/>

   SERVANT, to Lord Chief Justice<br/>

</p>

<p>  SIR JOHN FALSTAFF<br/>

   EDWARD POINS<br/>

   BARDOLPH<br/>

   PISTOL<br/>

   PETO<br/>

     Irregular humourists<br/>

</p>

<p>  ROBERT SHALLOW and SILENCE, country Justices<br/>

   DAVY, servant to Shallow<br/>

</p>

<p>  RALPH MOULDY<br/>

   SIMON SHADOW<br/>

   THOMAS WART<br/>

   FRANCIS FEEBLE<br/>

   PETER BULLCALF<br/>

     Country soldiers<br/>

</p>

<p>  LADY NORTHUMBERLAND<br/>

   LADY PERCY, Percy's widow<br/>

   HOSTESS QUICKLY, of the Boar's Head, Eastcheap<br/>

   DOLL TEARSHEET<br/>

</p>

<p>  LORDS, Attendants, Porter, Drawers, Beadles, Grooms, Servants,<br/>

     Speaker of the Epilogue<br/>

</p>

<p>INDUCTION<br/>

                         INDUCTION.<br/>

           Warkworth. Before NORTHUMBERLAND'S Castle<br/>

</p>

<p>  RUMOUR. Open your ears; for which of you will stop<br/>

     The vent of hearing when loud Rumour speaks?<br/>

     I, from the orient to the drooping west,<br/>

     Making the wind my post-horse, still unfold<br/>

     The acts commenced on this ball of earth.<br/>

     Upon my tongues continual slanders ride,<br/>

     The which in every language I pronounce,<br/>

     Stuffing the ears of men with false reports.<br/>

     I speak of peace while covert emnity,<br/>

     Under the smile of safety, wounds the world;<br/>

     And who but Rumour, who but only I,<br/>

     Make fearful musters and prepar'd defence,<br/>

     Whiles the big year, swoln with some other grief,<br/>

     Is thought with child by the stern tyrant war,<br/>

     And no such matter? Rumour is a pipe<br/>

     Blown by surmises, jealousies, conjectures,<br/>

     And of so easy and so plain a stop<br/>

     That the blunt monster with uncounted heads,<br/>

     The still-discordant wav'ring multitude,<br/>

     Can play upon it. But what need I thus<br/>

     My well-known body to anatomize<br/>

     Among my household? Why is Rumour here?<br/>

     I run before King Harry's victory,<br/>

     Who, in a bloody field by Shrewsbury,<br/>

     Hath beaten down young Hotspur and his troops,<br/>

     Quenching the flame of bold rebellion<br/>

     Even with the rebels' blood. But what mean I<br/>

     To speak so true at first? My office is<br/>

     To noise abroad that Harry Monmouth fell<br/>

     Under the wrath of noble Hotspur's sword,<br/>

     And that the King before the Douglas' rage<br/>

     Stoop'd his anointed head as low as death.<br/>

     This have I rumour'd through the peasant towns<br/>

     Between that royal field of Shrewsbury<br/>

     And this worm-eaten hold of ragged stone,<br/>

     Where Hotspur's father, old Northumberland,<br/>

     Lies crafty-sick. The posts come tiring on,<br/>

     And not a man of them brings other news<br/>

     Than they have learnt of me. From Rumour's tongues<br/>

     They bring smooth comforts false, worse than true wrongs.<br/>

  Exit<br/>

</p>

<h4>ACT I. SCENE I.

Warkworth. Before NORTHUMBERLAND'S Castle</h4>

<p>    Where is the Earl?<br/>

   PORTER. What shall I say you are?<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. Tell thou the Earl<br/>

     That the Lord Bardolph doth attend him here.<br/>

   PORTER. His lordship is walk'd forth into the orchard.<br/>

     Please it your honour knock but at the gate,<br/>

     And he himself will answer.<br/>

</p>

<p>  LORD BARDOLPH. Here comes the Earl.                Exit PORTER<br/>

   NORTHUMBERLAND. What news, Lord Bardolph? Every minute now<br/>

     Should be the father of some stratagem.<br/>

     The times are wild; contention, like a horse<br/>

     Full of high feeding, madly hath broke loose<br/>

     And bears down all before him.<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. Noble Earl,<br/>

     I bring you certain news from Shrewsbury.<br/>

   NORTHUMBERLAND. Good, an God will!<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. As good as heart can wish.<br/>

     The King is almost wounded to the death;<br/>

     And, in the fortune of my lord your son,<br/>

     Prince Harry slain outright; and both the Blunts<br/>

     Kill'd by the hand of Douglas; young Prince John,<br/>

     And Westmoreland, and Stafford, fled the field;<br/>

     And Harry Monmouth's brawn, the hulk Sir John,<br/>

     Is prisoner to your son. O, such a day,<br/>

     So fought, so followed, and so fairly won,<br/>

     Came not till now to dignify the times,<br/>

     Since Cxsar's fortunes!<br/>

   NORTHUMBERLAND. How is this deriv'd?<br/>

     Saw you the field? Came you from Shrewsbury?<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. I spake with one, my lord, that came from thence;<br/>

     A gentleman well bred and of good name,<br/>

     That freely rend'red me these news for true.<br/>

</p>

<p>  NORTHUMBERLAND. Here comes my servant Travers, whom I sent<br/>

     On Tuesday last to listen after news.<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. My lord, I over-rode him on the way;<br/>

     And he is furnish'd with no certainties<br/>

     More than he haply may retail from me.<br/>

   NORTHUMBERLAND. Now, Travers, what good tidings comes with you?<br/>

   TRAVERS. My lord, Sir John Umfrevile turn'd me back<br/>

     With joyful tidings; and, being better hors'd,<br/>

     Out-rode me. After him came spurring hard<br/>

     A gentleman, almost forspent with speed,<br/>

     That stopp'd by me to breathe his bloodied horse.<br/>

     He ask'd the way to Chester; and of him<br/>

     I did demand what news from Shrewsbury.<br/>

     He told me that rebellion had bad luck,<br/>

     And that young Harry Percy's spur was cold.<br/>

     With that he gave his able horse the head<br/>

     And, bending forward, struck his armed heels<br/>

     Against the panting sides of his poor jade<br/>

     Up to the rowel-head; and starting so,<br/>

     He seem'd in running to devour the way,<br/>

     Staying no longer question.<br/>

   NORTHUMBERLAND. Ha! Again:<br/>

     Said he young Harry Percy's spur was cold?<br/>

     Of Hotspur, Coldspur? that rebellion<br/>

     Had met ill luck?<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. My lord, I'll tell you what:<br/>

     If my young lord your son have not the day,<br/>

     Upon mine honour, for a silken point<br/>

     I'll give my barony. Never talk of it.<br/>

   NORTHUMBERLAND. Why should that gentleman that rode by Travers<br/>

     Give then such instances of loss?<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. Who- he?<br/>

     He was some hilding fellow that had stol'n<br/>

     The horse he rode on and, upon my life,<br/>

     Spoke at a venture. Look, here comes more news.<br/>

</p>

<p>  NORTHUMBERLAND. Yea, this man's brow, like to a title-leaf,<br/>

     Foretells the nature of a tragic volume.<br/>

     So looks the strand whereon the imperious flood<br/>

     Hath left a witness'd usurpation.<br/>

     Say, Morton, didst thou come from Shrewsbury?<br/>

   MORTON. I ran from Shrewsbury, my noble lord;<br/>

     Where hateful death put on his ugliest mask<br/>

     To fright our party.<br/>

   NORTHUMBERLAND. How doth my son and brother?<br/>

     Thou tremblest; and the whiteness in thy cheek<br/>

     Is apter than thy tongue to tell thy errand.<br/>

     Even such a man, so faint, so spiritless,<br/>

     So dull, so dread in look, so woe-begone,<br/>

     Drew Priam's curtain in the dead of night<br/>

     And would have told him half his Troy was burnt;<br/>

     But Priam found the fire ere he his tongue,<br/>

     And I my Percy's death ere thou report'st it.<br/>

     This thou wouldst say: 'Your son did thus and thus;<br/>

     Your brother thus; so fought the noble Douglas'-<br/>

     Stopping my greedy ear with their bold deeds;<br/>

     But in the end, to stop my ear indeed,<br/>

     Thou hast a sigh to blow away this praise,<br/>

     Ending with 'Brother, son, and all, are dead.'<br/>

   MORTON. Douglas is living, and your brother, yet;<br/>

     But for my lord your son-<br/>

   NORTHUMBERLAND. Why, he is dead.<br/>

     See what a ready tongue suspicion hath!<br/>

     He that but fears the thing he would not know<br/>

     Hath by instinct knowledge from others' eyes<br/>

     That what he fear'd is chanced. Yet speak, Morton;<br/>

     Tell thou an earl his divination lies,<br/>

     And I will take it as a sweet disgrace<br/>

     And make thee rich for doing me such wrong.<br/>

   MORTON. You are too great to be by me gainsaid;<br/>

     Your spirit is too true, your fears too certain.<br/>

   NORTHUMBERLAND. Yet, for all this, say not that Percy's dead.<br/>

     I see a strange confession in thine eye;<br/>

     Thou shak'st thy head, and hold'st it fear or sin<br/>

     To speak a truth. If he be slain, say so:<br/>

     The tongue offends not that reports his death;<br/>

     And he doth sin that doth belie the dead,<br/>

     Not he which says the dead is not alive.<br/>

     Yet the first bringer of unwelcome news<br/>

     Hath but a losing office, and his tongue<br/>

     Sounds ever after as a sullen bell,<br/>

     Rememb'red tolling a departing friend.<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. I cannot think, my lord, your son is dead.<br/>

   MORTON. I am sorry I should force you to believe<br/>

     That which I would to God I had not seen;<br/>

     But these mine eyes saw him in bloody state,<br/>

     Rend'ring faint quittance, wearied and out-breath'd,<br/>

     To Harry Monmouth, whose swift wrath beat down<br/>

     The never-daunted Percy to the earth,<br/>

     From whence with life he never more sprung up.<br/>

     In few, his death- whose spirit lent a fire<br/>

     Even to the dullest peasant in his camp-<br/>

     Being bruited once, took fire and heat away<br/>

     From the best-temper'd courage in his troops;<br/>

     For from his metal was his party steeled;<br/>

     Which once in him abated, an the rest<br/>

     Turn'd on themselves, like dull and heavy lead.<br/>

     And as the thing that's heavy in itself<br/>

     Upon enforcement flies with greatest speed,<br/>

     So did our men, heavy in Hotspur's loss,<br/>

     Lend to this weight such lightness with their fear<br/>

     That arrows fled not swifter toward their aim<br/>

     Than did our soldiers, aiming at their safety,<br/>

     Fly from the field. Then was that noble Worcester<br/>

     Too soon ta'en prisoner; and that furious Scot,<br/>

     The bloody Douglas, whose well-labouring sword<br/>

     Had three times slain th' appearance of the King,<br/>

     Gan vail his stomach and did grace the shame<br/>

     Of those that turn'd their backs, and in his flight,<br/>

     Stumbling in fear, was took. The sum of all<br/>

     Is that the King hath won, and hath sent out<br/>

     A speedy power to encounter you, my lord,<br/>

     Under the conduct of young Lancaster<br/>

     And Westmoreland. This is the news at full.<br/>

   NORTHUMBERLAND. For this I shall have time enough to mourn.<br/>

     In poison there is physic; and these news,<br/>

     Having been well, that would have made me sick,<br/>

     Being sick, have in some measure made me well;<br/>

     And as the wretch whose fever-weak'ned joints,<br/>

     Like strengthless hinges, buckle under life,<br/>

     Impatient of his fit, breaks like a fire<br/>

     Out of his keeper's arms, even so my limbs,<br/>

     Weak'ned with grief, being now enrag'd with grief,<br/>

     Are thrice themselves. Hence, therefore, thou nice crutch!<br/>

     A scaly gauntlet now with joints of steel<br/>

     Must glove this hand; and hence, thou sickly coif!<br/>

     Thou art a guard too wanton for the head<br/>

     Which princes, flesh'd with conquest, aim to hit.<br/>

     Now bind my brows with iron; and approach<br/>

     The ragged'st hour that time and spite dare bring<br/>

     To frown upon th' enrag'd Northumberland!<br/>

     Let heaven kiss earth! Now let not Nature's hand<br/>

     Keep the wild flood confin'd! Let order die!<br/>

     And let this world no longer be a stage<br/>

     To feed contention in a ling'ring act;<br/>

     But let one spirit of the first-born Cain<br/>

     Reign in all bosoms, that, each heart being set<br/>

     On bloody courses, the rude scene may end<br/>

     And darkness be the burier of the dead!<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. This strained passion doth you wrong, my lord.<br/>

   MORTON. Sweet Earl, divorce not wisdom from your honour.<br/>

     The lives of all your loving complices<br/>

     Lean on your health; the which, if you give o'er<br/>

     To stormy passion, must perforce decay.<br/>

     You cast th' event of war, my noble lord,<br/>

     And summ'd the account of chance before you said<br/>

     'Let us make head.' It was your pre-surmise<br/>

     That in the dole of blows your son might drop.<br/>

     You knew he walk'd o'er perils on an edge,<br/>

     More likely to fall in than to get o'er;<br/>

     You were advis'd his flesh was capable<br/>

     Of wounds and scars, and that his forward spirit<br/>

     Would lift him where most trade of danger rang'd;<br/>

     Yet did you say 'Go forth'; and none of this,<br/>

     Though strongly apprehended, could restrain<br/>

     The stiff-borne action. What hath then befall'n,<br/>

     Or what hath this bold enterprise brought forth<br/>

     More than that being which was like to be?<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. We all that are engaged to this loss<br/>

     Knew that we ventured on such dangerous seas<br/>

     That if we wrought out life 'twas ten to one;<br/>

     And yet we ventur'd, for the gain propos'd<br/>

     Chok'd the respect of likely peril fear'd;<br/>

     And since we are o'erset, venture again.<br/>

     Come, we will put forth, body and goods.<br/>

   MORTON. 'Tis more than time. And, my most noble lord,<br/>

     I hear for certain, and dare speak the truth:<br/>

     The gentle Archbishop of York is up<br/>

     With well-appointed pow'rs. He is a man<br/>

     Who with a double surety binds his followers.<br/>

     My lord your son had only but the corpse,<br/>

     But shadows and the shows of men, to fight;<br/>

     For that same word 'rebellion' did divide<br/>

     The action of their bodies from their souls;<br/>

     And they did fight with queasiness, constrain'd,<br/>

     As men drink potions; that their weapons only<br/>

     Seem'd on our side, but for their spirits and souls<br/>

     This word 'rebellion'- it had froze them up,<br/>

     As fish are in a pond. But now the Bishop<br/>

     Turns insurrection to religion.<br/>

     Suppos'd sincere and holy in his thoughts,<br/>

     He's follow'd both with body and with mind;<br/>

     And doth enlarge his rising with the blood<br/>

     Of fair King Richard, scrap'd from Pomfret stones;<br/>

     Derives from heaven his quarrel and his cause;<br/>

     Tells them he doth bestride a bleeding land,<br/>

     Gasping for life under great Bolingbroke;<br/>

     And more and less do flock to follow him.<br/>

   NORTHUMBERLAND. I knew of this before; but, to speak truth,<br/>

     This present grief had wip'd it from my mind.<br/>

     Go in with me; and counsel every man<br/>

     The aptest way for safety and revenge.<br/>

     Get posts and letters, and make friends with speed-<br/>

     Never so few, and never yet more need.                Exeunt<br/>

</p>

<h4>SCENE II.

London. A street</h4>

<p>  FALSTAFF. Sirrah, you giant, what says the doctor to my water?<br/>

   PAGE. He said, sir, the water itself was a good healthy water; but<br/>

     for the party that owed it, he might have moe diseases than he<br/>

     knew for.<br/>

   FALSTAFF. Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me. The brain of<br/>

     this foolish-compounded clay, man, is not able to invent anything<br/>

     that intends to laughter, more than I invent or is invented on<br/>

     me. I am not only witty in myself, but the cause that wit is in<br/>

     other men. I do here walk before thee like a sow that hath<br/>

     overwhelm'd all her litter but one. If the Prince put thee into<br/>

     my service for any other reason than to set me off, why then I<br/>

     have no judgment. Thou whoreson mandrake, thou art fitter to be<br/>

     worn in my cap than to wait at my heels. I was never mann'd with<br/>

     an agate till now; but I will inset you neither in gold nor<br/>

     silver, but in vile apparel, and send you back again to your<br/>

     master, for a jewel- the juvenal, the Prince your master, whose<br/>

     chin is not yet fledge. I will sooner have a beard grow in the<br/>

     palm of my hand than he shall get one off his cheek; and yet he<br/>

     will not stick to say his face is a face-royal. God may finish it<br/>

     when he will, 'tis not a hair amiss yet. He may keep it still at<br/>

     a face-royal, for a barber shall never earn sixpence out of it;<br/>

     and yet he'll be crowing as if he had writ man ever since his<br/>

     father was a bachelor. He may keep his own grace, but he's almost<br/>

     out of mine, I can assure him. What said Master Dommelton about<br/>

     the satin for my short cloak and my slops?<br/>

   PAGE. He said, sir, you should procure him better assurance than<br/>

     Bardolph. He would not take his band and yours; he liked not the<br/>

     security.<br/>

   FALSTAFF. Let him be damn'd, like the Glutton; pray God his tongue<br/>

     be hotter! A whoreson Achitophel! A rascal-yea-forsooth knave, to<br/>

     bear a gentleman in hand, and then stand upon security! The<br/>

     whoreson smooth-pates do now wear nothing but high shoes, and<br/>

     bunches of keys at their girdles; and if a man is through with<br/>

     them in honest taking-up, then they must stand upon security. I<br/>

     had as lief they would put ratsbane in my mouth as offer to stop<br/>

     it with security. I look'd 'a should have sent me two and twenty<br/>

     yards of satin, as I am a true knight, and he sends me security.<br/>

     Well, he may sleep in security; for he hath the horn of<br/>

     abundance, and the lightness of his wife shines through it; and<br/>

     yet cannot he see, though he have his own lanthorn to light him.<br/>

     Where's Bardolph?<br/>

   PAGE. He's gone into Smithfield to buy your worship horse.<br/>

   FALSTAFF. I bought him in Paul's, and he'll buy me a horse in<br/>

     Smithfield. An I could get me but a wife in the stews, I were<br/>

     mann'd, hors'd, and wiv'd.<br/>

</p>

<p>  PAGE. Sir, here comes the nobleman that

committed the

     Prince for striking him about Bardolph.

   FALSTAFF. Wait close; I will not see him.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. What's he that goes there?

   SERVANT. Falstaff, an't please your lordship.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. He that was in question for the robb'ry?

   SERVANT. He, my lord; but he hath since done good service at

     Shrewsbury, and, as I hear, is now going with some charge to the

     Lord John of Lancaster.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. What, to York? Call him back again.

   SERVANT. Sir John Falstaff!

   FALSTAFF. Boy, tell him I am deaf.

   PAGE. You must speak louder; my master is deaf.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. I am sure he is, to the hearing of anything good.

     Go, pluck him by the elbow; I must speak with him.

   SERVANT. Sir John!

   FALSTAFF. What! a young knave, and begging! Is there not wars? Is

     there not employment? Doth not the King lack subjects? Do not the

     rebels need soldiers? Though it be a shame to be on any side but

     one, it is worse shame to beg than to be on the worst side, were

     it worse than the name of rebellion can tell how to make it.

   SERVANT. You mistake me, sir.

   FALSTAFF. Why, sir, did I say you were an honest man? Setting my

     knighthood and my soldiership aside, I had lied in my throat if I

     had said so.

   SERVANT. I pray you, sir, then set your knighthood and your

     soldiership aside; and give me leave to tell you you in your

     throat, if you say I am any other than an honest man.

   FALSTAFF. I give thee leave to tell me so! I lay aside that which

     grows to me! If thou get'st any leave of me, hang me; if thou

     tak'st leave, thou wert better be hang'd. You hunt counter.

     Hence! Avaunt!

   SERVANT. Sir, my lord would speak with you.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. Sir John Falstaff, a word with you.

   FALSTAFF. My good lord! God give your lordship good time of day. I

     am glad to see your lordship abroad. I heard say your lordship

     was sick; I hope your lordship goes abroad by advice. Your

     lordship, though not clean past your youth, hath yet some smack

     of age in you, some relish of the saltness of time; and I most

     humbly beseech your lordship to have a reverend care of your

     health.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. Sir John, I sent for you before your expedition to

     Shrewsbury.

   FALSTAFF. An't please your lordship, I hear his Majesty is return'd

     with some discomfort from Wales.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. I talk not of his Majesty. You would not come when I

     sent for you.

   FALSTAFF. And I hear, moreover, his Highness is fall'n into this

     same whoreson apoplexy.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. Well God mend him! I pray you let me speak with you.

   FALSTAFF. This apoplexy, as I take it, is a kind of lethargy, an't

     please your lordship, a kind of sleeping in the blood, a whoreson

     tingling.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. What tell you me of it? Be it as it is.

   FALSTAFF. It hath it original from much grief, from study, and

     perturbation of the brain. I have read the cause of his effects

     in Galen; it is a kind of deafness.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. I think you are fall'n into the disease, for you

     hear not what I say to you.

   FALSTAFF. Very well, my lord, very well. Rather an't please you, it

     is the disease of not listening, the malady of not marking, that

     I am troubled withal.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. To punish you by the heels would amend the attention

     of your ears; and I care not if I do become your physician.

   FALSTAFF. I am as poor as Job, my lord, but not so patient. Your

     lordship may minister the potion of imprisonment to me in respect

     of poverty; but how I should be your patient to follow your

     prescriptions, the wise may make some dram of a scruple, or

     indeed a scruple itself.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. I sent for you, when there were matters against you

     for your life, to come speak with me.

   FALSTAFF. As I was then advis'd by my learned counsel in the laws

     of this land-service, I did not come.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. Well, the truth is, Sir John, you live in great

     infamy.

   FALSTAFF. He that buckles himself in my belt cannot live in less.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. Your means are very slender, and your waste is

     great.

   FALSTAFF. I would it were otherwise; I would my means were greater

     and my waist slenderer.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. You have misled the youthful Prince.

   FALSTAFF. The young Prince hath misled me. I am the fellow with the

     great belly, and he my dog.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. Well, I am loath to gall a new-heal'd wound. Your

     day's service at Shrewsbury hath a little gilded over your

     night's exploit on Gadshill. You may thank th' unquiet time for

     your quiet o'erposting that action.

   FALSTAFF. My lord-

   CHIEF JUSTICE. But since all is well, keep it so: wake not a

     sleeping wolf.

   FALSTAFF. To wake a wolf is as bad as smell a fox.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. What! you are as a candle, the better part burnt

     out.

   FALSTAFF. A wassail candle, my lord- all tallow; if I did say of

     wax, my growth would approve the truth.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. There is not a white hair in your face but should

     have his effect of gravity.

   FALSTAFF. His effect of gravy, gravy,

   CHIEF JUSTICE. You follow the young Prince up and down, like his

     ill angel.

   FALSTAFF. Not so, my lord. Your ill angel is light; but  hope he

     that looks upon me will take me without weighing. And yet in some

     respects, I grant, I cannot go- I cannot tell. Virtue is of so

     little regard in these costermongers' times that true valour is

     turn'd berod; pregnancy is made a tapster, and his quick wit

     wasted in giving reckonings; all the other gifts appertinent to

     man, as the malice of this age shapes them, are not worth a

     gooseberry. You that are old consider not the capacities of us

     that are young; you do measure the heat of our livers with the

     bitterness of your galls; and we that are in the vaward of our

     youth, must confess, are wags too.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. Do you set down your name in the scroll of youth,

     that are written down old with all the characters of age? Have

     you not a moist eye, a dry hand, a yellow cheek, a white beard, a

     decreasing leg, an increasing belly? Is not your voice broken,

     your wind short, your chin double, your wit single, and every

     part about you blasted with antiquity? And will you yet call

     yourself young? Fie, fie, fie, Sir John!

   FALSTAFF. My lord, I was born about three of the clock in the

     afternoon, with a white head and something a round belly. For my

     voice- I have lost it with hallooing and singing of anthems. To

     approve my youth further, I will not. The truth is, I am only old

     in judgment and understanding; and he that will caper with me for

     a thousand marks, let him lend me the money, and have at him. For

     the box of the ear that the Prince gave you- he gave it like a

     rude prince, and you took it like a sensible lord. I have check'd

     him for it; and the young lion repents- marry, not in ashes and

     sackcloth, but in new silk and old sack.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. Well, God send the Prince a better companion!

   FALSTAFF. God send the companion a better prince! I cannot rid my

     hands of him.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. Well, the King hath sever'd you. I hear you are

     going with Lord John of Lancaster against the Archbishop and the

     Earl of Northumberland.

   FALSTAFF. Yea; I thank your pretty sweet wit for it. But look you

     pray, all you that kiss my Lady Peace at home, that our armies

     join not in a hot day; for, by the Lord, I take but two shirts

     out with me, and I mean not to sweat extraordinarily. If it be a

     hot day, and I brandish anything but a bottle, I would I might

     never spit white again. There is not a dangerous action can peep

     out his head but I am thrust upon it. Well, I cannot last ever;

     but it was alway yet the trick of our English nation, if they

     have a good thing, to make it too common. If ye will needs say I

     am an old man, you should give me rest. I would to God my name

     were not so terrible to the enemy as it is. I were better to be

     eaten to death with a rust than to be scoured to nothing with

     perpetual motion.

   CHIEF JUSTICE. Well, be honest, be honest; and God bless your

     expedition!

   FALSTAFF. Will your lordship lend me a thousand pound to furnish me

     forth?

   CHIEF JUSTICE. Not a penny, not a penny; you are too impatient to

     bear crosses. Fare you well. Commend me to my cousin

     Westmoreland.

                                 Exeunt CHIEF JUSTICE and SERVANT

   FALSTAFF. If I do, fillip me with a three-man beetle. A man can no

     more separate age and covetousness than 'a can part young limbs

     and lechery; but the gout galls the one, and the pox pinches the

     other; and so both the degrees prevent my curses. Boy!

   PAGE. Sir?

   FALSTAFF. What money is in my purse?

   PAGE. Seven groats and two pence.

   FALSTAFF. I can get no remedy against this consumption of the

     purse; borrowing only lingers and lingers it out, but the disease

     is incurable. Go bear this letter to my Lord of Lancaster; this

     to the Prince; this to the Earl of Westmoreland; and this to old

     Mistress Ursula, whom I have weekly sworn to marry since I

     perceiv'd the first white hair of my chin. About it; you know

     where to find me.  [Exit PAGE]  A pox of this gout! or, a gout of

     this pox! for the one or the other plays the rogue with my great

     toe. 'Tis no matter if I do halt; I have the wars for my colour,

     and my pension shall seem the more reasonable. A good wit will

     make use of anything. I will turn diseases to commodity.

  Exit</p>

<h4>SCENE III.

York. The ARCHBISHOP'S palace</h4>

<p>Enter the ARCHBISHOP, THOMAS MOWBRAY the EARL MARSHAL, LORD HASTINGS,

and LORD BARDOLPH</p>

<p>  ARCHBISHOP. Thus have you heard our cause and known our means;<br/>

     And, my most noble friends, I pray you all<br/>

     Speak plainly your opinions of our hopes-<br/>

     And first, Lord Marshal, what say you to it?<br/>

   MOWBRAY. I well allow the occasion of our amis;<br/>

     But gladly would be better satisfied<br/>

     How, in our means, we should advance ourselves<br/>

     To look with forehead bold and big enough<br/>

     Upon the power and puissance of the King.<br/>

   HASTINGS. Our present musters grow upon the file<br/>

     To five and twenty thousand men of choice;<br/>

     And our supplies live largely in the hope<br/>

     Of great Northumberland, whose bosom burns<br/>

     With an incensed fire of injuries.<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. The question then, Lord Hastings, standeth thus:<br/>

     Whether our present five and twenty thousand<br/>

     May hold up head without Northumberland?<br/>

   HASTINGS. With him, we may.<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. Yea, marry, there's the point;<br/>

     But if without him we be thought too feeble,<br/>

     My judgment is we should not step too far<br/>

     Till we had his assistance by the hand;<br/>

     For, in a theme so bloody-fac'd as this,<br/>

     Conjecture, expectation, and surmise<br/>

     Of aids incertain, should not be admitted.<br/>

   ARCHBISHOP. 'Tis very true, Lord Bardolph; for indeed<br/>

     It was young Hotspur's case at Shrewsbury.<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. It was, my lord; who lin'd himself with hope,<br/>

     Eating the air and promise of supply,<br/>

     Flatt'ring himself in project of a power<br/>

     Much smaller than the smallest of his thoughts;<br/>

     And so, with great imagination<br/>

     Proper to madmen, led his powers to death,<br/>

     And, winking, leapt into destruction.<br/>

   HASTINGS. But, by your leave, it never yet did hurt<br/>

     To lay down likelihoods and forms of hope.<br/>

   LORD BARDOLPH. Yes, if this present quality of war-<br/>